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ClockPro FAQ

My device sometimes sounds a little later. Why?

Due to the operation system of your device, PalmOS, the device cannot wake up to make a sound or any other action at any time but on a whole minute only. If you set an alarm to 6:22:10 and your device is off, you will hear the sound at 6:23:00. That can make up to 59 seconds offset. If you need exact timing you have to disable the auto-off feature by tapping the little lock icon in ClockPro.

If the delay is longer than 1 minute then you probably have an older PalmOS version. Please dowload the latest free PalmOS upgrade directly from Palm Computing site.


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Can I switch between AM/PM and military time format?

Yes, you can. ClockPro uses system preferences of your device for displaying time, date, first day of week etc. You can adjust these formats there. Just launch Prefs application using your app launcher, choose Formats in the upper right hand pop-up list, and adjust Time, Date or Week starts formats as desired. ClockPro will use them.


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What are the three upper left hand icons?

They control the notification for each page. On Clock page they control what happens at chime time, on Timer page what happens at timer expiration and on Alarm page they determine what happens when alarm comes off.

They are three ways of notification in ClockPro:


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Can the timer count down to zero?

Yes, of course. The timer can count from and to any time between 00:00:00 and 99:59:59. Just go to Options / Timer menu and set the desired timer range, e.g. 00:30:00 to 00:00:00.


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Can the timer count more than 100 hours?

Yes, it can count almost for ever (up to 12 years). You can use it to time your battery life for instance. Here is one of the possible setups:
  1. Go to Options / Timer menu and set the timer range to be 24 hours, e.g. 00:00:00 to 24:00:00. Also check the Restart when expired option.
  2. Go to Timer page, reset and start the timer (tap the colon and then the two right hand big digits), and then turn on the laps display (above the big digits).
Now the lap number will show you how many days (laps) have elapsed. The big digits will show how much of another day has elapsed.


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Can the timer show 1/100th of a second?

No, it cannot. This precision has no real sense unless you use an optical / electronic timing system. Even if you really concentrate and watch your subject your reaction time is about 0.2 second.

Constant update of the 1/100th of a second on the display also drains batteries as the device must be working all the time. When you have to update the display just once in a second your device can spend most of the time in idle mode.

If you want this feature anyway, let us know. If there are enough requests, we can add it.


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How can I control the timer?

There are three invisible timer buttons placed over the big digits. These buttons are active not only on Timer page but on all the three pages (Clock/Timer/Alarm) so that you can control the timer from any page.


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Can I use ClockPro as a desk clock?

Yes, it is one of the ClockPro features. Choose Clock, Timer or Alarm page and the value you want to see on the small digits and then disable auto-off by tapping the lock icon. Put your handheld device into its cradle and you have a cool desk clock.


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Can I use ClockPro as a chess timer?

Why not? You can time anything you want. Here are the instructions:
  1. Go to Options / Timer menu and set the desired timer range, e.g. 00:02:00 to 00:00:00, and the sound that will inform you when the range expires. Do not forget to turn the sound on using the bell icon on the Timer page. The timer will count down from 2 minutes to zero and will play the sound when zero is reached.
  2. Go to Timer page and choose Timer total to be displayed on the small digits. This value will tell you how long you have been playing. If you look at the lap numbers, you will see how many moves you have made.
  3. Reset and start the timer. When a player has made the move just tap the New lap button (the two left hand big digits). The timer will imediately start counting down from 2 minutes again.


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I need a short sound every 90 seconds. How can I do it?

You can use the timer. Here are the instructions:
  1. Go to Options / Timer menu and set the timer range to be 90 seconds, e.g. 00:01:30 to 00:00:00. Check the Restart when expired option and choose the sound.
  2. Go to Timer page, disable auto-off (tap the lock icon), reset the timer (tap the colon of big digits), turn on the sound (tap the bell icon) and then start the timer (tap the two right hand big digits).
Again, you can see the total time elapsed and the number of your 'laps', i.e. the 90 second intervals.


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I take medication 4 times a day. Can ClockPro help me?

Sure. You can use the Chime feature for instance. Here are two examples:

Example A: Signals at 12 am + 6 am + 12 pm + 6 pm

  1. Go to Clock settings - double tap the Clock tab or use menu Options / Clock.
  2. Set the period 'Chime' to 6 hr.
  3. Black out the desired days of week on the day selector bar (S M T W T F S).
  4. Choose the time bounds for chiming. In this example you can set 12:00:00 am to 12:00:00 am which means no limits.

Example B: Signals at 8 am + 12 pm + 4 pm + 8 pm

  1. Go to Clock settings - double tap the Clock tab or use menu Options / Clock.
  2. Set the period 'Chime' to 4 hr.
  3. Black out the desired days of week on the day selector bar (S M T W T F S).
  4. Choose the time bounds for chiming. In this example you can set 8:00:00 am to 8:00:00 pm which will eliminate chimes at 12 am and 4 am.

Finally, you can choose the sound and how many times you want it to repeat. You can set it to repeat 30 times and when the sound goes off, you can always interrupt it by pressing any hardware button (PageUp/Down or 4 app buttons). Do not forget to activate the sound - the bell icon on the Clock page must be visible.


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Can I easily preview all the sounds?

Yes, you can. Go to Clock page for instance, turn on the sound using the bell icon and then choose Options / Clock. Whenever you pick a sound from the list you will hear that sound. If you turn on the backlight blinking using the bulb icon, you will see the light pattern for each sound.


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Why cannot I hear any sounds in ClockPro?

Most likely because you set it up so - we are not aware of any bugs in ClockPro. To set up an alarm, go to ClockPro, tap the top right hand Alarm tab so that it is highlighted and tap the top left hand little bell icon (this means "sounds on"). Then tap the Alarm tab again and select the sound you want to hear from the Sound list. You must hear the sound whenever you select it, otherwise you have something set wrong - see below.

There are many other conditions that can prevent the sounds to be heard. For instance, in ClockPro menu Options / Notification, be sure that you do not have the box "Tale instead of sound" checked. Another option is the built-in Prefs application - be sure that you have the Alarm sound turned on and at an appropriate volume. There are also plenty of 3rd party applications that can intercept alarms, change alarm sounds, silence the device, etc. so check these as well.


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What is displayed on the big digits?

It is your system time on Clock page, last timer lap on Timer page and time to alarm on Alarm page.

See also: Why are the numbers on Alarm page counting backwards?


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Can I choose what should be displayed on the big digits?

Sorry, you cannot. The big digits will always display the main time, last timer lap and time to alarm.


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I sleep like a log. Can the sound play more than 30 times?

Well, Alarm sound can play up to 330 times. If you set up the snooze time in Options / Alarm menu to something else than zero and turn off the info screen icon on Alarm page so that only the bell icon is on, then the Alarm will be rescheduled automatically up to 10 times.


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Is there a silent backlight alarm feature in ClockPro?

Sure, there is. You can choose the method of notification for chiming, timer expiration and alarm. If you want just backlight blinking, turn on the light bulb icon and turn off the bell and screen icons on the appropriate Clock/Timer/Alarm page.

See also What are the three upper left hand icons?


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What is the funny sound I can hear after my alarm?

That is a snooze sound. If you set a non-zero snooze time in Options / Alarm and did not turn on the info screen icon above the bell icon then the alarm will be automatically snoozed up to 10 times. The sound will let you know that the alarm was snoozed.

If you do not like this sound you can turn it off. Just go to Alarm settings and uncheck the Play Snooze sound box.

You can also snooze an alarm by pressing the PageUp/PageDown buttons on your device while the alarm sound is playing.


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How do I shut off the sounds?

Just press any hardware button (PageUp/Down or 4 app buttons) while the sound is playing.

If the sound playing is produced by Alarm (not by Clock chiming or Timer expiration) you can choose whether you want to shut off the sound and snooze the alarm at the same time (then press PageUp/Down buttons) or whether you just want to shut off the alarm without snooze (then press one of the 4 app buttons).


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How do I discard snoozed alarm?

If you have snoozed the alarm and want to cancel it, go to Alarm page and turn off all the notification icons (screen, bell, bulb). You can turn them back on immediately if you want to schedule another alarm.


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Can I turn off these frames and outlines?

Sure. They are here to help you locate the inactive icons and digits. If you do not like them, go to Options / General menu and choose none or icons in Outline controls list.


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Can I turn on the sound for chiming only?

Of course. The three pages (Clock/Timer/Alarm) are independent and you can turn the sound on or off on each page without affecting other pages.


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Can I get to the settings faster than from the menu?

Yes, there is a way. Just tap the active (i.e. black) Clock/Timer/Alarm tab. In other words, from any page you can double tap the desired tab and get right into the settings screen.


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How do I set the alarm?

Double tap the Alarm tab to get to alarm setting dialog. Then tap the 'Set Alarm to' rectangle and set the desired time. Choose the days of the week on the 'repeated' bar. Then choose what sound you want to hear. Below you can also set the 'Snooze time'. Press 'Ok' button and check out you have the bell icon active on Alarm page.

See also What are the three upper left hand icons?


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Why are the numbers on Alarm page counting backwards?

The big digits on Alarm page show how much time until alarm goes off.

In ClockPro, the alarm is set to some time ('Set Alarm to' rectangle in Alarm settings) even if you do not have any notification on (sound, info screen, backlight). This allows you to see how much time left you have until meeting, how much more your flight will last etc. without the need to hear the sound when the alarm goes off.

If you want the numbers to stop counting, you can unselect all days on the 'repeated' day selection bar in Alarm settings.


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Does TaleLight/TaleVibes work with ClockPro?

Yes, ClockPro can directly control Tale devices which generate vibrating or flashing alarms. These alarms can be triggered along with sound/backlight or instead of sound/backlight.

To customize the way ClockPro treats your Tale device, use menu Options / Notification. Please note that if you use the TaleMute hack that disables all sounds on your device you will not hear ClockPro sounds no matter what you set in Notification preferences screen.

For more information about flashing and vibrating hardware add-ons, visit the Tech Center Labs site.


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Can the blinking alarms damage backlight?

According to answer #125 at PalmSource Developer Knowledge Base it is not a problem. We have tested prolonged backlight blinking on several devices and have not found any problems. None of our users reported a problem either, so we think it is safe.

However, please note that we are not responsible for any damage or consequences. Use this feature at your own risk. If you don't want the blinking alarms, you can always turn them off by unselecting the top left hand bulb icon.


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ClockPro alarms do not wake up my Palm device. Why?

This is a known problem of PalmIIIx and PalmV devices. This problem is not caused by ClockPro. Any other app including the built-in DateBook will have the same problem. It appears to be a bug in the operating system.

You can fix it by performing a warm reset. Just press the button in the small hole on the back of your device. No data will be lost after the warm reset.


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